When Philip Seymour Hoffman jabbed that needle into his arm for the last time, he triggered a myriad of news stories and public displays of grief and adoration. He was a talented actor who reached the pinnacle of his profession when received an Oscar for his performance in the film, Capote.

There is much we can learn from these recent events in one of the high end neighborhoods of New York City. Among them is that the notoriety of his death does not make it any more tragic than if he had been an unknown teenager seduced by the momentary euphoria of a drug induced high. Here was a man at the top of his profession, yet there was obviously something amiss in his life that drove him to his path down the road of chemical escapism.

As one who probably has seen his work, but has no lasting recollection of witnessing it, I can’t say I felt the sense of loss as when Elvis Press, John Belushi or even Nick Adams left us. I must also confess that I am much more disturbed by the flag draped coffins coming back from the middle east than I am about the passing of an over-privileged member of the Hollywood elite. Hoffman was, after all, an actor who made his living pretending to be someone he was not. However, he was a fellow human being, created to do wonderful and amazing things. In this, I feel the same sense of loss I would feel for anyone who leaves us at an early age… particularly as a result of bad decisions.

[The first part of this article was published yesterday… read it here.]

by David Theroux

According to a Radar Online source “with inside knowledge of the network’s machinations,” the New York Daily News has reported that “It’s an absolute disaster for A&E. . . . Now, it’s a standoff between the family and the network, who is going to blink first? There is no way Phil is going to apologize for his comments because he doesn’t think what he said is hateful or prejudice, it’s his religious beliefs. . . . A&E isn’t going to walk away from ‘Duck Dynasty,’ they can’t afford to do it. It’s just a matter of getting both sides to agree on how to move forward.”

And indeed this is exactly what has happened, even though GLAAD is not glad about A&E’s reversal, stating that “Phil Robertson should look African American and gay people in the eyes and hear about the hurtful impact of praising Jim Crow laws and comparing gay people to terrorists.” In response, Brietbart’s Warner Todd Huston has noted: “It is interesting that GLAAD put Robertson’s comments about African Americans first in its own statement about his comments on homosexuals. One might think that GLAAD feels it lost the battle on that issue and needed the cover of ‘racism’ to add heft to its complaints. Still, the statement takes Robertson’s comments out of context and mischaracterizes them. Robertson made no such claim that Jim Crow laws did not harm African Americans, nor did he ‘compare’ homosexuals to terrorists.”

Cultural “leftists” have been pursuing a campaign against Judeo-Christianity, traditional morality, gender identities, the nuclear family, limited constitutional government, free enterprise, the family, civility, individual liberty, personal responsibility, the rule of law, and much more. In the name of “tolerance” and “diversity,” this campaign has sought to impose a “secular theocracy” to smother bourgeois values and coercively impose “progressive” culture on an unwilling public, and gender issues have become a key rallying point (see, for example, articles in the Wall Street Journal, National Catholic Register, Hartford Courant, Reuters, and Washington Times).

Phil Robertson himself is certainly no lightweight. The Los Angeles Times has called him “a man of legendary individuality, who once passed up an opportunity to sign with the NFL because it might interfere with his hunting.” One of seven children raised in a log cabin in northern Louisiana with no electricity, bathtub, or toilet, Robertson grew up in a poor family living off garden fruits and vegetables; deer, squirrels, fish, and other animals that they hunted and fished; and the pigs, chickens, and cattle that they raised.

Nevertheless, in high school he became All-State in football, baseball, and track and received a football scholarship to Louisiana Tech University. At Tech, later football legend Terry Bradshaw was at the time benched as second-string to Robertson, who was star quarterback. And although Robertson chose to quit football in college for the freedom to hunt during duck season, he went on to receive a master’s degree in education, taught school, and became a commercial fisherman. In 1972, the young enterprising Robertson patented his first duck call and created the Duck Commander Company, which has been leveraged into today’s vast fortune and cultural phenomenon that includesDuck Dynasty. His autobiography Happy, Happy, Happy became a number oneNew York Times bestseller, and his new book for 2014, Phil-osophy, will share his philosophy of life, as he outlined in an interview before the release of his autobiography

My message is to get human beings to love God, love their neighbor and for the life of me I just don’t see the downside of human beings not being so mean to one another and actually care for one another and not steal from one another and not murder each other for their tennis shoes. That’s the message I have. . . . America and the world, we have a love problem. I’m trying to get people aware of that. A loving person is not going to pick up a spear or a knife because when the Ten Commandments were written it was before guns, and God was saying, “Look, quit murdering each other.” Now I’m just trying to say, “Folks, let’s try to love one another no matter what the color of their skin.”

The opening ceremony of each Olympics is a revealing window into the character and aspirations of the host country. China’s 2008 bigger, louder, longer spectacular left little of her hegemonic ambitions to the imagination; Britain’s 2012 descent into self-parody–from Shakespeare and Churchill to dancing nurses on government hospital beds and fake action heroes parachuting with figurehead monarchs–testified equally well to her flaccid quiescence. We can expect something along the Chinese line from Russia in a couple of weeks, but suppose Chicago had been successful in its bid to host the 2016 summer games. What would an opening ceremony in President Obama’s America (and hometown) look like?

Probably all too much like the British–another glimpse of the sun setting in the West: An opening dance number featuring Julia leading Pajama Boy around a cheery Organizing for Action office; an alternative lifestyles choir singing “We Are the World”; a video tribute to historic woman chiefs of state set to a mashup of Fleetwood Mac hits (ready for Hillary?); and, of course, a speech by the president himself as the better-than-fireworks grand finale–teleprompter, Greek columns, and all.

That the American regime, and American political culture with it, has changed is without question. But for those who yearn to recover some of the better aspects of the regime and culture that has passed us by, the question is: how?

With A&E Network facing an avalanche of public protest and in just over one week of its decision to place family-patriarch Phil Robertson on “indefinite hiatus” from its megahit reality series Duck Dynasty, the network caved.

When the PC outrage industry went into high gear with an angry Gay & Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation (GLAAD) demanding Robertson’s head regarding his comments on homosexuality in an article by Drew Magery in the January 2014 issue of GQ (the magazine commonly viewed as having branded the concept of “metrosexual”), A&E executives promptly suspended Robertson from the enormously popular, cable-TV program, and support for his suspension echoed throughout the conventional media with cries of his being “homophobic” and “antigay.”

In the article, when asked about his religious faith, Robertson noted that his own youthful debauchery was self-destructive and put his marriage on the rocks, and that these were reversed only by his conversion to Christianity. He added that he now considers sexual relations other than those between a man and woman in wedlock to be sinful. In so doing, Robertson did not support bans on homosexual advocacy or relations but instead paraphrased Corinthians: “Don’t be deceived. Neither the adulterers, the idolaters, the male prostitutes, the homosexual offenders, the greedy, the drunkards, the slanderers, the swindlers — they won’t inherit the kingdom of God. Don’t deceive yourself. It’s not right.”

Just before Christmas of 1776, Thomas Paine wrote “These are the times that try men’s souls”. Thus began an article he called The Crisis. He outlined the circumstances of the freedom seeking colonists and the obstacles and threats that lay all about them. These were critical times. The quest for liberty could have shriveled on the vine instead of producing the greatest nation on earth. We face a similar crisis today: will the United States regain the virtue and prosperity they once enjoyed, or will they be reduced to just another socialist state that sucks the economic and spiritual life out of the productive citizens?

While the American people are living through the nightmare of ObamaKare, the Obama regime is tightening its grip on so many others of our lives. Labor participation rate is the lowest it has been in years. People are being hemmed in by more and more intrusive regulations from the EPA, TSA, DHS and a host of other alphabet soup agencies.

Meanwhile Barack Hussein Obama is fanning the flames of racial hatred and division, telling his followers how much they have have suffered at the hands of the white oppressors. They are believing now, more than ever, that something must be done to redress… or even retaliate… for real or imagined wrongs.

In 2010 millions of American tea-party constitutionalists, to include the GOP’s Christian base, united in a remarkable grass-roots effort to rein in our unbridled federal government and return it to its expressly limited constitutional confines. As a result, an unprecedented number of counter-constitutionalist lawmakers (read: liberal Democrats) were swept from office.

The Obama administration wasn’t going to take this lying down. Whether it was by tacit approval or via direct order remains largely immaterial. The president quickly and unlawfully politicized the Internal Revenue Service, using it as a weapon against his political enemies. In an explosive scandal that continues to grow, the Obama IRS was caught – smoking gun in hand – intentionally targeting conservative and Christian organizations and individuals for harassment, intimidation and, ultimately, for political destruction.

Not only has Obama faced zero accountability for these arguably impeachable offenses, he has since doubled down. With jaw-dropping gall, his administration has now moved to officially weaponize the IRS against conservatives once and for all.

Everywhere I go, I meet people who seem to believe that it’s all over, that there is no hope, that freedom is forever doomed. The doom and gloomers are omnipresent. But there is a great line in the newest version of the movie “Red Dawn” that should help put it all in perspective. One of the freedom fighters says, “I’m still breathing so, it’s not over.” I love that line. I feel exactly the same way.

There is no question that the forces of globalism and socialism have pretty much had their way over the past few decades. And with very few exceptions, we don’t have a lot of allies in Washington, D.C., and in most State capitals. For that matter, we don’t have a lot of allies on Wall Street or in most classrooms. But that doesn’t mean that it’s over: not by a long shot.

Freedom didn’t have a majority in 1775 and 1776, either. I doubt that one could find any time in history when the proponents of liberty were ever in a majority. Sam Adams may have said it best when he said, “It does not take a majority to prevail…but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.”

Phil Robertson has been kicked off Duck Dynasty indefinitely for speaking out against one of the ruling class’s sacred cows – the homosexual community. To make things worse, he even quoted one of the sources most despised by those who worshiping at the feet of big government – the Bible. It makes no difference to them that our creator made His views perfectly clear in I Corinthians 6:9-10:

Or do you not know that the unrighteous will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: neither the sexually immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor men who practice homosexuality, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.

It is common for those who believe in little more than themselves and human wisdom to be critical of the church and Christian teachings. Piers Morgan even had the audacity comment that the anachronistic Catholic Church needs to be dragged kicking and screaming into the twenty-first century – as if changing human values should bring about changes in the church’s teaching.

We have seen much over the past few days about the greatness of South Africa’s former President, Nelson Mandela. We were told about all the inspirational things he said and how he led the effort to eliminate apartheid that oppressed the black majority in his country. It was a job that needed to be done, but under the leadership of Mandela’s African National Congress, South Africa has been reduced from a prosperous western power to a crime ridden third world nation.

Most reports simply say that he was a political prisoner for twenty-seven years. The reality of his imprisonment was that he could have been released at various points if he had simply renounced the use of violence. It could be argued that there are times when that this would be appropriate, however when we see the violence perpetrated by his supporters on their political enemies, we see that much was not done to the oppressive government, but against citizens of their land.

The idea of placing a tire around someone’s neck, filling it with gasoline and igniting is too barbaric and meant simply as an exercise in terrorism that fed the lust for revenge. However, this has all been reported, but generally ignored.

It’s that bustling time between Thanksgiving and Christmas (Christ’s Mass), our nationally recognized and congressionally “established” birthday celebration for Jesus, the sovereign Lord of all mankind. Now is a valuable opportunity to reflect upon our nation’s past, present and future (our true past, not the historically revised version propagated by secular-”progressives”).

First, for the public school-educated: No, Thanksgiving was not about high-fiving the Indians for corn on the cob. In his 1789 Thanksgiving Day Proclamation, George Washington made abundantly clear exactly Whom America should thank, and why.

Washington began by declaring that “it is the duty of all nations to acknowledge the providence of Almighty God, to obey His will, to be grateful for His benefits, and humbly to implore His protection and favor” so that a special day might “be devoted by the people of these States to the service of that great and glorious Being who is the beneficent author of all the good that was, that is, or that will be; that we may then all unite in rendering unto Him our sincere and humble thanks for His kind care and protection of the people of this country” as well as “for the civil and religious liberty with which we are blessed.”

There has been a lot of talk about the concept of a third party. The Libertarian Party has been vying for that position for many years. While they have some very good limited government principles, there are a few ideas that just won’t make it in the real world. It’s not the purpose of this article to discuss the virtues and vices of that party. However, if they ever rise above the role of spoiler in close elections, that would make them a viable fourth party.

The currently active third party is a branch of the Republican Party. You can say the party establishment is represented by the term, or the conservatives struggling under their “big tent”. It doesn’t matter. The point is that there are two distinct groups of people attempting to function under one banner. This disparity of views works fine for the Democrats who make no pretense of standing on any kind of principle, but does not go well for a party where some cling to real principles and others try to cling to power.

We see this nationally where the old timers in the Senate are horrified that some of their newer members are actually taking actions against some of the government overreaches. Members of this august body have given their lip service to this action for years. It is true, Tea Partiers have primaried entrenched legislators, sometimes successfully. However now, the Republican Party is talking of sending primary opposition to some of their own, like Mike Lee and Justin Amash to name a few.

Pat Buchanan recently wrote an intriguing column titled, “Is Red State America Seceding?” His column clearly reveals that an independence/secession movement is spreading globally. Pat rightly observes that in just the last few years some 25 nations have broken free of mother countries and formed their own independent states. And, no, most of these separations did NOT require violent revolution. In addition, talk of secession is currently going on in at least six other regions of the world. And, as Buchanan correctly observes, the spirit of secession is very much alive and well in the United States.

Buchanan writes, “The five counties of western Maryland–Garrett, Allegany, Washington, Frederick and Carroll, which have more in common with West Virginia and wish to be rid of Baltimore and free of Annapolis, are talking secession.”

But people in Maryland are not the only ones talking secession. Buchanan continues to write, “Ten northern counties of Colorado are this November holding non-binding referenda to prepare a future secession from Denver and the creation of America’s 51st state.”

“For they sow the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind.” That is what Hosea 8:7 tells us. And nowhere do we see evidence of this more grotesquely obvious than in our public school system. There are many fine, dedicated teachers trying to do a good job of educating our children, but they are not the one’s setting policies and promoting the lies of their progressive masters.

Just a few miles up the road from my home two girls, one 12 and one 14 bullied a 12 year old classmate to the point where she took a deadly dive off a tower at an abandoned concrete plant. The reports are that more than a dozen girls took part in the harassment that led Rebecca Sedwick to choose death over life.

Many of us who consider ourselves to be pro-life are concerned with helping women choose life for their unborn baby, but this poor girl could not even choose it for herself. Worse yet, the girls not only goaded her to a hopeless suicide, but gloated about it in the same social media they used to kill her.

If the events over the past several weeks aren’t enough to get your blood boiling, you either have not been paying attention, or you may be suffering from the same moral turpitude that has afflicted the Obama regime. There is not space enough here to name them all, but we can list a small sample… such as 90 year old war heroes prevented from seeing the monument to their sacrifices, or the same National Mall opened up to illegal aliens for a demonstration in favor of more wealth transfer from law abiding citizens to themselves. Or perhaps the most heartless of all, the withholding of benefits to families of soldiers killed in Obama’s Middle East distraction.

We see the lapdog press is trying to place all the blame for the government shutdown on the Republicans who have, up to this point, been standing firm against the funding of the abominable ObamaKare. Hopefully the American show more wisdom than they did in 2012 election. The 37% approval rating the President enjoys and the 18% agreement that the country is headed in the right direction is an indication that that they the citizens are smarter than the leaders think.

The year 2013 is already an incredibly sad year for me–and it’s not even over yet. I can tell you for a fact that the melancholy side of my temperament is being sorely tested.

As the date of this column is so close to the infamous date of 9/11, I was going to write about the spiral into a police state that the would-be tyrants in Washington, D.C., are plunging us into. Of course, 9/11 is the excuse for every big-government abridgment of liberty that has taken place over the last 12 years. 9/11 was the justification for the invasion of Iraq and Afghanistan; it was the justification for passing the Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, and the NDAA. 9/11 justifies the Department of Homeland Security, the TSA, and USNORTHCOM. 9/11 is the excuse given for launching deadly drone attacks against all kinds of people in Pakistan, Yemen, Libya, etc. And now, 9/11 is the excuse for a brand new military action against Syria.

Police can break down the door of your house without a warrant because of 9/11; police can set up checkpoints on America’s highways because of 9/11; you and I can be indefinitely incarcerated without being told why and without being allowed legal counsel because of 9/11; Americans can be sent off to prison–even foreign prisons–without benefit of a trial because of 9/11; American citizens can even be killed by government agents without being charged with a crime because of 9/11; entire cities (such as Boston) can be thrust into martial law because of 9/11. All of our electronic correspondence, phone calls, and financial activity can be monitored by the feds because of 9/11. The list is endless.

At some point, one has to wonder why America’s churches are the largest block of irrelevant, impotent, and insignificant institutions in the entire country. And make no mistake about it: when it comes to influencing societal conditions, culture, and the political philosophy of the nation, for all intents and purposes, they ARE irrelevant, impotent, and insignificant.

Think about it: according to the latest available statistics, over 75% of America’s adults classify themselves as Christians. That’s over 159 million people. Over 43% of America’s adults attend the more than 300,000 churches regularly. That’s over 90 million people. Yes, both of these statistics are WAY DOWN from just a few years ago, but those statistics still represent a HUGE block of the American population. So why do these Christians and churches have so very little influence in America’s society, culture, and politics? Asking it bluntly, why is America going to hell in a handbasket with all of these churches dotting the landscape?

There is no mistaking the fact that from before the American Revolution, after the American Revolution, throughout the Eighteenth and Nineteenth centuries, and through the first half of the Twentieth Century, the American Church was a major voice and influence in virtually every facet and sphere of American society. However, with the exception of a temporary resurgence in the 1980s, the influence of the Church in the last half of the Twentieth Century and continuing now into the Twenty First Century is nada. Zilch.

To one CBS news reporter, all the candidates to replace Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as Iran’s president appear to have little difference between their “conservative” philosophies and those of the Tea Party. She continues that the man selected will be more open to some “liberal” changes… as if the term denotes something good and desirable.

To many, this is just a slap in the face to the political enemies of the current administration. However, the thinking goes much deeper than political hostility. To the secular mind, all religions are pretty much the same and have about the same amount toxicity to our society. Please recall the fuss about Mitt Romney’s Mormon faith prior to the recent presidential election. This did not come from anyone defending the “purity” of the Christian faith. It came from those uncomfortable with any kind of faith in any kind of deity that stood above man, and, primarily, government.

Washington, DC—Joining together, pledging in solidarity to defend marriage at an historic moment in history, a group of Catholic, Orthodox, and Protestant Christian clergy and leaders released a statement entitled: “We Stand in Solidarity to Defend Marriage and the Family and Society Founded Upon Them.” The Marriage Solidarity Statement was drafted by Deacon Keith Fournier, Editor of Catholic Online and Chairman of Common Good Alliance, and Mat Staver, Chairman of Liberty Counsel Action. It was vetted among other Christian pastors and leaders and signed onto by leading Christian clergy and leaders collectively representing tens of millions of Christians.

Acknowledging that differences exist between the signers on important matters of religious doctrine and practice, they declare that “on the matter of marriage, we stand in solidarity.” The statement affirms “that marriage and family have been inscribed by the Divine Architect into the order of creation. Marriage is ontologically between one man and one woman, ordered toward the union of the spouses, open to children and formative of family. Family is the first vital cell of society; the first church, first school, first hospital, first economy, first government and first mediating institution of our social order. The future of a free and healthy society passes through marriage and the family.”

Being fully aware that the Supreme Court will release opinions on two marriage cases involving California Proposition 8 and the Federal Defense of Marriage Act, the statement affirms that marriage predates government and cannot be redefined by civil institutions, including the United States Supreme Court. “Redefining the very institution of marriage is improper and outside the authority of the State. The Supreme Court has no authority to redefine marriage.” The statement refers to the 1992 Supreme Court abortion decision in Planned Parenthood v. Casey, in which Justice O’Connor candidly acknowledged that, unlike the Legislative Branch, which has the power of the purse, and the Executive Branch that has the figurative power of the sword, the Supreme Court’s source of authority rests solely upon the legitimacy of its decisions in the eyes of the people. The statement then declares: “If the Supreme Court were to issue a decision that redefined marriage or provided a precedent on which to build an argument to redefine marriage, the Supreme Court will thereby undermine its legitimacy. The Court will significantly decrease its credibility and impair the role it has assumed for itself as a moral authority. It will be acting beyond its proper constitutional role and contrary to the Natural Moral Law which transcends religions, culture, and time.”

Yesterday’s vote by the Boy Scouts National Council to admit openly gay scouts is another example of liberals gaining positions of power while others went about the day to day operation of helping boys. The decision comes after 61 percent of leaders, parents and members polled nixed the idea with only 34 percent supporting it.

This is standard operating procedure for progressives… to insinuate themselves into leadership positions and inflict their will on the rest of the population. Being ordered about by the elites is, somehow, the antithesis of what America is all about… or at least used to be about.

Many parents have declared their unwillingness to have their sons participate in the scouting program that had been a bastion of clean living American values. However, those in charge of the organization now believe they have been called upon to change this. It seems that these people are now considering homosexual behavior to be part of the clean living code. It also seems that the implied sexual activity is acceptable to them where they may not want they scouts to be similarly involved with their own daughters.

There’s an elephant in the living room. Only it isn’t an elephant, and it isn’t in the living room. It’s a golden calf, and it’s in our baptismal font and our pulpit and our sanctuary and our Sunday School class and our Bible study group and everywhere else we worship and serve God, because, truth be told, it’s in our hearts.

To put it bluntly: We, the church of Jesus Christ, have an idol.

It’s called ministry.

Ministry?

Yes, ministry: busying ourselves with the things of God. Granted, ministry seems very un-idol-like. But then, subtlety is the hallmark of seductive sins. It has been the devil’s most effective stratagem since the beginning of time: Get the sin to seem no sin. Better, get it to seem like service to God. Better still, get it to be service to God. Sins don’t get more subtle than that, nor does idolatry seem like idolatry when we’re busy doing things God instructed us to do. It seems like true Christianity, like pure and undefiled religion.

Obama’s liberation theology preaching pastor, Jeremiah Wright is well known for his comment that “America’s chickens are coming home to roost”. Scandals of all sorts are popping up around the District of Columbia quicker than the “bimbo eruptions” of the Clinton administration. It could well be that Barack Hussein Obama’s chickens are coming home to roost.

Proverbs 28:13 tells us, “Whoever conceals his transgressions will not prosper, but he who confesses and forsakes them will obtain mercy.” We have seen all sorts of dereliction of presidential responsibilities. We have seen members of his administration – including cabinet members – acting against the best interests of the American people for years. Then we have seen them lie about it to cover their actions and nefarious motives. It’s hard to keep up with all the scandals without a scorecard.

The deaths of four Americans in Bengahzi, Libya is the big one that started it off. It is obvious to anyone who has been paying attention that we can have no confidence at all in anything we are told by the regime. Those of us who have not been blinded by the president’s brilliance have known all along that what we were told and what was going on were two entirely different things. Now, what was known by some is being laid bare for all to see.

[Editor's note: Much of today's column may be controversial. However, as we have seen many events in recent years that cause us to wonder what is happening to our country, many of us have had ideas that we were not getting the full story. I would suggest that if even a portion of this speculation has a basis in reality, we have some real problems.]

The title of today’s column, “There Is A Conspiracy,” is a direct quote from Ezekiel 22:25. In this passage, God instructed Ezekiel to blow the whistle on the conspiracy of Israel’s prophets to deny people truth, to devour people’s souls, to defraud people’s substance, and to destroy people’s lives. I dare say this conspiracy is still alive and well today. Many pastors and religious leaders in 2013 America are as guilty of Ezekiel’s charges as were Israel’s ancient prophets.

However, use the word “conspiracy” today and even most Christians will roll their eyes in disbelief. And, of course, the mainstream media is so paranoid of the word conspiracy that one has to speculate that the reason for this aversion to objectively dealing with the subject is simply due to the fact that they are among the co-conspirators.

But once in awhile, someone in the media has the guts to broach the subject of conspiracy. My friends at TruthAlliance.net recently covered a report written by Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone Magazine. Taibbi begins his report saying, “Conspiracy theorists of the world, believers in the hidden hands of the Rothschilds and the Masons and the Illuminati, we skeptics owe you an apology. You were right. The players may be a little different, but your basic premise is correct: The world is a rigged game. We found this out in recent months, when a series of related corruption stories spilled out of the financial sector, suggesting the world’s largest banks may be fixing the prices of, well, just about everything.”

Not since 1775 has a central government in America attempted to disarm its citizens in the way that President Barack Obama and Senator Dianne Feinstein did recently. King George III attempted to disarm the colonists on April 19, 1775, and that attempt ignited America’s War for Independence. Leading the charge to resist the banning and confiscation of their firearms were colonial pastors such as Jonas Clark. Back then, America’s pastors had a thorough comprehension of the Biblical principles of liberty, including the right to keep and bear arms. They taught their congregations these sacred principles with such zeal and persuasion that the attempt by those British troops to march on Lexington and Concord and seize the colonists’ guns was met with the now famous “shot heard ’round the world.” Ever since that historic event, the people’s right to bear arms has been held sacred by the vast majority of Americans–Christian or otherwise. The right to bear arms was understood to be, not just a right, but a God-ordained duty, a long time before it was ever enshrined in the Second Amendment to the US Constitution.

The recent attempt by Barack Obama and Dianne Feinstein to ban semi-automatic rifles, limit magazine capacity, and create universal background checks and gun registration was as close to what old King George attempted to do as this nation has ever seen. Fortunately, public outcry against this egregious gun grab was so unmistakably loud and clear that these gun control bills failed to pass even the Democrat-controlled Senate. Thank God for every person and group around the country that rose up to defeat this piece of modern-day tyranny.

However, if you think that Obama and Feinstein are going to abandon their attempt to outlaw and confiscate your guns, you are sadly mistaken. They will not stop. But the good news is neither will we!

Reading over some recent news stories I have to seriously wonder about the mental stability and capacity of some of the people making decisions for our country and our families. What is frightening is that when these people speak, the believe, or at least seem to believe, that they are making sense. Then we have the people who blindly follow and accept anything the left does that they believe will get them more free stuff from the government.

Debbie Wasserman Schultz thought she had a sympathetic ear when she told Piers Morgan that ”It is irresponsible and un-American, quite frankly, for my Republican colleagues in Congress to be jumping on this immediately as a political opportunity.”

I’m not sure how it is un-American to attempt to learn the details of an administration failure that led to the deaths of an ambassador and three patriots assigned to protect him. This statement is revealing in a number of ways, but most importantly, is shows the leftist mindset that everything is political… patriotism and love of family have no place in their thinking.

There’s an ongoing debate in Reformed and Evangelical circles regarding the mission of the church. That’s good, because the Body of Christ needs to be clear on what the Head expects the hands and feet to be doing.

But the way one frames the question can greatly affect the answer. So we need to make sure we’re rightly framing the question.

What is it going to take for pastors and churches to wake up and realize that America is in the throes of a burgeoning police state? Ladies and gentlemen, the long-standing veneration for law and order does not include blind submission to governmental abuse of power. Yet, it seems that very few Christian conservatives are even paying attention to what is happening before their very eyes.

For example, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has purchased over 2 billion rounds of hollow-point ammunition (enough to wage a 30-year war); the DHS has purchased over 7,000 AR-15s. The DHS calls them Personal Defense Weapons (PDW). These are the same semi-automatic rifles with high capacity magazines that when you and I buy them are called “assault rifles.” Plus, the DHS has purchased over 2,700 armored vehicles, the same kind that the US military uses in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Department of Defense (DOD) calls them MRAP (Mine Resistant Ambush Protected). They carry .50 caliber weapons that fire from inside the vehicle. The vehicle itself is impervious to mines and small-arms fire. They are the vehicle of choice for our combat troops in the Middle East.

Rand Paul is taking center stage in a performance that make Jimmy Stewart proud. As this is written, he has brought the lethargic Senate to a halt and, as a friend exclaimed, finally the American people are getting the representation they are paying for. We see one man standing up the dictates of an imperial president. Some colleagues are standing with him, as are a host of the American people. Cowardly colleagues can only hide in the bushes, dining with the President even, and watch as a real leader does his job.

At least on commentator complained that Senator Paul is only doing this because he doesn’t trust the government. Well… duh! I would ask what our government has done to inspire trust. Having an aversion to the truth is not a good place to start.

In some ways, the issue at hand is almost immaterial. The fact that we have a champion preaching the virtues of freedom and limited government in the heart of the beast should give us all hope that the republic can be saved. The fact that many who say they are on the same team turn their backs on his spirited efforts shows them to be unworthy of the positions they hold.

[Editors note: We summarized the book Obama lives by a few years ago. As we see events unfolding, they will make more sense if they are viewed in the context of Alinsky's writings.]

The book Rules for Radicals by Saul Alinsky rose to prominence as some looked into the past and strategies of community organizer and presidential candidate Barack Hussein Obama. It outlined the tactics and strategies he used and even taught in efforts to enforce his version of social justice on the American people.

It would do us well to have a look at these rules, since they have been used effectively against our society. Learning about his approach, and the methods used by the radicals surrounding the President can prepare us for dealing with them. We can even pick up a few pointers and turn some of them around on the current political establishment.

Rule 1: Power is not only what you have, but what an opponent thinks you have. This means they community organizers become masters of illusion… deceit even. It comes down to attempts at intimidating the other side into concessions they would not make if they understood the reality.

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